


Why Stop

by pinetreelady



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Domestic, Future Fic, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Kid Fic, M/M, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-20
Updated: 2017-07-20
Packaged: 2018-12-04 17:01:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11559549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pinetreelady/pseuds/pinetreelady
Summary: A future fic where Sid hires a surrogate, has a daughter, retires a couple of years before Geno, and takes a job in the Pens organization. The Fleurys still live in Pittsburgh; Flower is on the Pens coaching staff. Taylor plays in the CWHL. Everyone’s avidly speculating about Geno’s (imminent) retirement announcement and (presumed) subsequent return to Russia.





	Why Stop

**Author's Note:**

> I'm stuck on a longer story so I've gone back into my gdocs to see what I can finish up and post. More will be coming. 
> 
> I started this one in the spring of 2016. 
> 
> Many people's help and encouragement got me to the finish line, but especially elisera and icedbatik, as well as taylor8771, whose helpful suggestions pushed me to get this finished at last! Many thanks, but as always, any errors are my own.

"Dad. Daddy. DAD. It's braiding time!" Sarah bounces on her toes in front of him, and Sid smiles down at her.

"You have to do the special goalie braids today!" The morning sun slanting through the kitchen window makes her eyes sparkle -- at least, what he can see of her eyes, given that her curls are particularly riotous this morning.

"Really," he says, feigning reluctance. "You sure that's _today_?"

"Coach promised I'd be in goal today, so special goalie braids, yes, just like Auntie Taylor!"

Sid smiles and gathers her hair back off her face, peering down at her. "Oh! There you are! I was wondering who was underneath all that hair."

"Daaaad," she says, rolling her eyes.

"We'd better do your braids before breakfast so you can actually eat, hmm?" He asks, tweaking her hair gently.

Usually they just pull it back in a ponytail for breakfast and fix it properly afterward, but it's Saturday morning, nearly time for her hockey game, and well. It's important to have routines on game day.

She darts off to rummage in the cabinet in the half-bath off the kitchen for a brush and elastics, then perches on the high stool at the breakfast bar and obediently turns her back to him. 

As Sid carefully works the tangles out of her hair, Sarah chatters about the oatmeal she's going to eat in a few minutes, warm from its overnight simmer in the slow cooker, with yogurt, maple syrup, and fresh berries. Her enthusiasm is infectious; Sid’s stomach grumbles.

Most days he just does a simple single braid down the back of her head, but given the way her helmet fits, well. She prefers two braids when she's playing hockey. Sid doesn't know how much of that is really her own preference and how much is Taylor's influence, but it's not like it matters, as long as she’s happy with it.

"And Uncle Flower says you always have to move, side-to-side, like -- " Sarah’s explaining now, and twitches as if to demonstrate. Sid keeps a gentle grip on her hair, the strands threaded between his fingers.

"Hey, baby, show me your moves after, okay? I don't want to mess up your braids."

She stills instantly and says, "Oh, yeah, oops."

Sid's abruptly reminded of nearly 20 years ago, in his parents' kitchen, when it was Taylor on the stool, their dad with his fingers carefully working plaits of her hair, Sid watching raptly from his seat on the counter. To them, braids were Dad's domain, and so it felt entirely normal for Sid to learn to braid Taylor’s hair. It’s a skill that's obviously serving him well at this stage in his life. 

He snaps an elastic around Sarah’s second braid and then tilts her head gently, critically looking to be sure they align.

“You wanna go look in the mirror?” he asks, as Sarah spins on her chair. 

“Nope!” She puts her hands up to feel her hair and smiles at him. “I know it’s right.”

He drops a kiss on the top of her glossy head. 

“You ready for breakfast, munchkin?” 

She nods and slides off her chair.

“I’ll get the spoons and the bowls, okay, Dad?”

He stops and smiles at how grown-up she sounds, thinking back to when she first started playing hockey. How he overheard her telling Taylor via Skype, so seriously, “Coach says I should get my mom to braid my hair for the game, but ...”

Sid remembers how his heart clenched at the way her voice trembled.

“Ask your dad to do it,” Taylor had suggested gently.

Sarah’s incredulous “Really?” would have made him indignant if it had come from anyone else.

“My dad -- your grandpa -- did mine when I was little,” Taylor told her conspiratorially. “I bet your dad can do yours.”

Sid had taken his phone out of his pocket and texted Taylor a heartfelt _thanks_ right then.

At that point it had been years since Sid had braided anyone’s hair; he had to brush up his rusty skills. But, not for the first time in his life, muscle memory had kicked in, and Sarah had been so thrilled that she asked for braids often and fairly insisted on them for game days. 

Every now and again, some well-meaning parent asks with a touch of condescension he knows he’s not imagining, “And who did your braids for you, dear?” Hearing her proudly announce, “My _dad_!” warms his heart like nothing else.

*

Sid’s got his phone jammed under his chin and it makes his neck hurt.

“Make it quick, Marc; I’m trying to get dinner made. This one-handed shit is ridiculous.” He glances guiltily over his shoulder when the curse word slips out, but Sarah’s out of earshot, thankfully.

Three days ago, Sid had slipped and gone down wrong on a patch of black ice in his driveway, badly spraining his right wrist. He had no idea how hard it would be to run his household this way -- thank god Estelle Fleury’s coming to stay for the weekend to help with Sarah, and meal prep, basic household things. Marc’s probably calling to talk logistics.

Flower chuckles softly down the phone.

“You keep trying to boss me around, even if you haven’t been my captain for years.”

“Did you have something you actually needed to tell me, or are you just heckling?”

“Yeah, sorry.” There’s real regret in Flower’s voice now. “Listen, Sid. Estelle won’t be able to come by this weekend, after all. Vero’s mom is sick again, and she’s taking the girls for a quick trip back home.”

“Oh, no,” Sid says, and puts the casserole and the potholder down, lifts his hand to hold the phone properly. “It’s okay, of course. What’s going on? Is she --”

“We think she’ll be fine, but pneumonia, you know? Sucks when her health’s already fragile.” He sounds stressed out, worried. Flower loves his mother-in-law.

“Oh, absolutely. Please send her my best, okay? And don’t worry. We’ll figure something out.”

Flower’s the Pens’ assistant goalie coach and can’t get away to make the trip with his family. Sid knows this; being a coach is almost as hard as being a player, when it comes to getting time away for family. It sucks, but it’s been their reality long enough that they’re as used to it as they can be.

“You are gonna need help, though,” Flower says. “You know who’d be happy --”

Sid cuts him off.

“Don’t, Marc.”

“I’m just saying. He’d be there for you in a heartbeat, if you would just stop being so goddamn stubborn. And he adores Sarah.”

Sid sighs.

“You’ve made your point.”

“One more thing. He asked me why you’re being weird. He thinks he did something wrong. It might be time to actually talk to him, all right?”

“Please give Vero and the girls my best,” Sid says firmly, meaning it, but also meaning the change of subject.

“Will do.” Flower sounds resigned, but, well. It’s not his business.

Sid puts down his phone and flexes his fingers, carefully focusing on that and not thinking about what Flower just told him. 

Sid’s using his left hand for everything, and it’s annoying how much it aches from relying on it so much. He scowls down at the bandage wrapping his sprained right wrist. He has to keep it immobilized. He _can_ use it, but it’ll take longer to heal if he does. Injuries frustrate him just as much now as they did when he was playing. He wishes he could muscle through and be fine, but bodies don’t work that way, and -- much as it pains him to admit it -- even less so as he gets older. Waiting, resting, doesn’t get any easier with time.

He runs the fingers of his good hand through his hair and blows out a breath. Maybe Taylor can come down for a few days. He thinks about her busy schedule and shakes his head. Damn it.

*

“Daddy! What are we gonna do about my braids?” Sarah wails that evening when he gently tells her about Estelle’s changed plans.

She’s a child. Of course she’s focusing on how the changed plans affect _her_. It’s selfish, but not unnaturally so; it’s just how kids are. But it’s times like these he wishes he had a partner, a co-parent, to help talk him down from wanting to tell her in no uncertain terms that the world doesn’t revolve around her, that his goddamn wrist hurts and it’s not like he injured himself to make her life hard. 

Sinking to the level of a 7-year-old doesn’t seem like particularly good parenting, so he manages to keep his mouth shut.

He waits a minute or two, just sitting beside her.

“Lots of lady hockey players just wear a low ponytail,” he tells her conversationally, after she’s -- maybe -- calmed down enough to hear him. She knows this; they watch women’s hockey every chance they get.

“No!” she says, voice quivering. “That’s not right, I need my braids.” She clenches her fists. “You know what? Forget it! I just won’t play at all.” Sarah twists away from him, curling in on herself in the corner of the couch, angry tears leaking down her cheeks.

This is progress, Sid reminds himself. She’s using her words; she’s not simply screaming at him and stomping up to her room in anger, the way she might have a few months ago. He tells himself to breathe. He’s the adult here.

He runs his good hand over her head and retreats the short distance to the kitchen.

Parenting doesn’t seem to get any easier. Even when he’d been completely clueless in her infancy, it was easier to fix what was wrong, to make things better. This? There are so many variables, and it’s just plain hard. 

Once Sarah passes out from exhaustion, he calls to update Taylor, and to let off a little steam.

“She totally freaked out when I told her Estelle can’t come this weekend. I just -- I don’t know what to do.”

“You have someone who’d help you, Sid, if you weren’t so damn stubborn,” she says.

“Why is everyone calling me stubborn?”

Taylor laughs.

“Oh, Sid. Let me guess. You talked to Flower, and he told you to call Geno.”

Sid exhales softly.

“It’s not that simple, Taylor.”

“It’s simpler than you think, though,” she says gently.

Sid closes his eyes, bites back his argument, trying to believe her instead of letting his kneejerk response take over.

Things used to be simple between him and Geno. They’d stayed close through the years, of course, quiet fixtures in one another’s lives. Until these last few months when things got weird -- when, maybe, Sid made them weird.

At the beginning of the season, Geno had quietly let the Pens organization know that he's planning to retire at the end of the season, but the news hasn't gone public, hasn’t even been shared with the team yet.

Rumors have swirled for years. This year, now that he’s forty, the speculation has ramped up more than ever. Sid worries that Geno’s going to just leave, return to Russia, leaving a huge hole in Sid and Sarah’s lives. 

Sid hasn’t come out and asked, though, and Geno certainly hasn’t volunteered anything. Sid only knows Geno’s news in a professional context, and it feels like crossing a line to inquire about Geno’s plans on a personal level. It’s up to Geno to bring it up. 

But Sid's been withdrawing himself and Sarah away from him, just a bit, because he wants not to rely so heavily on someone who's probably on his way out of their lives.

“You could at least try asking,” Taylor says, breaking into his thoughts.

“I’ll think about it,” Sid says, finally, after a long moment. “But I have to go now.”

“Yeah, bro. Me, too,” Taylor says. “Love you.”

Sid sits with his phone in his hand, biting his lip. He forces himself to examine the assumptions he’s been clinging to all season, and how much he and Sarah have missed Geno lately. He thinks about what Flower and Taylor had said, and suddenly his reasons for pulling away from Geno feel petty, childish: turning his back on something before it leaves him. 

He takes a breath, scrolls down to Geno’s number, and hits call.

“Sid?” Geno’s surprised, happy tone makes Sid wince a little, guilt poking at him over how little they’ve talked lately, compared to -- before these past few months. 

“Hi, Geno,” Sid says. “Listen, I’m sorry, but are you around Saturday morning? Sarah and I could use your help.” He doesn’t know how to begin to talk about the past few months, and he feels bad for ignoring it, but maybe it’ll somehow take care of itself. 

Yeah, right.

*

“Hi, Sarah,” Geno says from the doorstep, where Sarah’s opened the door with Sid right behind her.

“Geno!” The way her face lights up around Geno catapults Sid through an array of emotions: guilt, for how little time they’ve spent together lately; hope, for how much Sarah adores Geno; worry, about how she’s too attached to someone who’s most likely gearing up to leave. 

“I hear your Papa hurt himself,” Geno says.

“Yeah, and he can’t do my braids.” Sarah pouts a little.

“Mmm,” Geno sounds sympathetic.

“Do you know how to braid hair, Geno?” she asks hopefully.

“Not much, no,” Geno says, shaking his head. “But maybe Sid can teach me. He very good at tell people what to do.”

Sarah laughs delightedly.

“He tells me what to do all the time!” she agrees. “Does he boss you around, too?”

Geno’s smile is indulgent. “Sometimes.” His face sobers, though, and he says, “It his job, tell you what to do, Sarah. He is your papa.”

“I know,” she says, and Sid can tell from her tone that she’d like to roll her eyes at yet another grownup telling her something she already knows.

Turns out Geno does, in fact, know how to braid, it’s just French braiding that’s elusive. And after a false start or five, they get her hair passably braided. It’s not as neat as when Sid does it, but it meets Sarah’s approval, and that’s what matters.

“You can practice on me anytime,” she tells Geno magnanimously. 

“I like that idea,” Geno says, his eyes meeting Sid’s, Sarah oblivious to the undertones of what she’s said. 

They stare at each other, the moment stretching long between them. Then Sarah starts to chatter about her game, and the moment breaks.

“Good luck at game, Sarah,” Geno tells her, and crouches down to hug her. “You call me, tell me if win, if score, yeah?”

“I will! And sometime, you should come to one of my games,” she tells him.

He nods solemnly.

“We make plan.”

“You have a game tonight, right?” she asks him, and he nods again. “Tomorrow, you should come over for pizza,” Sarah continues. “As a thank you, for braiding my hair.” She turns to Sid. “Okay, Daddy?” 

Sid’s protective instincts say it’s a bad idea, but he can’t resist both pairs of hopeful eyes turned his way.

“Sure,” he says, and smiles. “Let’s do that.” 

It feels good to say yes.

*

That night, Sid and Sarah curl up to watch the Pens game on TV. Sid comes in the room with a bowl of popcorn and a couple of water bottles, to find Sarah scowling at Liam McHugh and company.

"Daddy, why did that man on TV say Geno's going back to Russia forever?"

Sid groans. Fucking Milbury, always a blowhard, shooting off his mouth on subjects he’d be better off leaving alone. 

"Well, Sarah, you know that’s Geno’s home," Sid says, belatedly muting the TV, and mentally kicking himself a little. He’s usually better at doing that preemptively.

"No! His home is _here_ , in Pittsburgh!"

Sid's heart twists, because hell if he doesn’t feel exactly the same. 

“Why would he leave us?” she asks plaintively.

“Lots of people love Geno, baby,” Sid tells her. “His family, his oldest friends, they live in Russia and he misses them.” 

“But I don’t want him to go live far away, Daddy.”

_Neither do I_ , Sid thinks. “I know,” he says, and pulls her close against his side.

Intermission finishes, and they watch the rest of a Pens power play in silence. 

Sid doubts Sarah’s done talking about Geno, and he tries to think what to say to make it better. Instead, his thoughts wander to Geno’s years of on-again, off-again relationships, of dates and hookups but no one special, nobody long-term. Geno’s not the settling-down type, or maybe he is, just not _here_. Maybe Russia is the answer to that, too, Sid thinks wistfully.

“I’m going to ask Geno to stay in Pittsburgh,” Sarah announces, but she sends Sid a look as if asking permission, for which Sid is grateful.

“You can’t, baby,” he tells her regretfully.

She pouts, but Sid knows she hears him.

“You ask for me, then,” she insists, and Sid nods helplessly. It’s impossible, of course, but for Sarah he’ll try.

*

Geno shows up the next day for pizza, as promised, and they put in _The Lion King_ after a long, serious discussion between Geno and Sarah; Sid knows enough to stay out of it. Sid tamps down the familiar attraction he’s always felt in the face of Geno’s patience with Sarah’s slow process of making up her mind. 

Pizza topping selection takes slightly less negotiation, fortunately, made easier by their mutual agreement that vegetables, save tomato sauce, have no place on pizza.

Sid averts his eyes from Sarah curling up into Geno’s side on the couch, from Geno’s soft, affectionate smile aimed down at the top of her head.

Sarah falls asleep as the credits begin to roll, though they let them play all the way through to the end, Sid watching the rise and fall of her breath, how young her face still looks, slack with sleep. 

As the movie stops, Sid says, "I have to get her to bed."

Geno looks pointedly at Sid’s bandaged wrist.

"I do, Sid."

"Geno," Sid protests. "She's my kid. I can get her to bed."

"Most stubborn," Geno tells him, and sweeps Sarah up into his arms in one smooth movement.

“Why does everyone keep saying that,” Sid mutters, and Geno shoots him a look that’s equal parts exasperated and fond.

Sid hovers, but Geno gets Sarah into bed and under the covers without rousing her. It's a good thing Sid had insisted on pajamas and tooth-brushing before they started the movie. Geno leans down and presses a soft kiss to her forehead. Sid’s heart clenches. 

Sid lingers in the doorway after Geno steps out, watching her for a moment, but she’s dead to the world. He carefully pulls the door shut and heads back down the hall. Geno’s waiting at the top of the stairs, peering out the window at the crescent moon.

“Pretty,” he offers, and Sid stops next to him, looks out, too.

He glances at Geno. He’s watching Sid steadily.

Sid’s breath catches, and he wonders when his heart started to pound.

Geno leans in and Sid wants what’s coming so badly he aches with it. He wants to feel Geno’s arms around him, wants their lips to meet, their bodies to press together at last, but he puts a hand on Geno’s chest to stop him from getting any closer.

“Geno,” he says, voice hoarse. “Don’t.”

Geno freezes, eyes huge. “Why stop, Sid?”

Sid sighs. “This won’t work.”

Geno studies his face carefully, gaze flicking back and forth between Sid’s eyes. “Why not?” He sounds so earnest, so heartfelt, that Sid can’t help the treacherous thump of his heart. 

It feels manipulative to bring up Sarah, but her request to ask Geno about going back to Russia suddenly feels, unexpectedly, like the right thing to say in this moment. 

The plaintive way she’d said _why would he leave us_ threatens to come right out of his mouth, and Sid checks himself, sighs, and runs a hand over his hair.

“Sarah asked me, yesterday, why you’re moving back to Russia, when you retire. She heard the idiots on NBC speculating, and -- I know it’s what’s right for you, but I can’t start something now, when you’ll be going so soon.” He bites his lip. “Plus, you don’t really do long-term, either, and I -- I need -- stability, for Sarah, but for me, too, and I --”

Geno’s mouth drops open, his eyes wide and disbelieving. “What you _talking_ about, Sid? What you mean? This -- most wrong!” His voice is quiet, in deference to Sarah sleeping down the hall, but heavy with certitude.

Sid shakes his head, opens his mouth to speak, but Geno’s not done.

“Why you think I -- leave you? Why you think, not last? Not ever leave, if you say stay. But you never -- you never _say_ , Sid, and I can’t read minds, not even yours.”

Speechless doesn’t even begin to describe the reeling kaleidoscope of Sid’s thoughts. “But you -- you’re not -- you always date around, you don’t commit to anyone, and I know you’re retiring, and that means you’ll go back to Russia.”

“Sid.” Geno catches Sid’s chin with one hand, tilts his head up so their eyes meet. He shakes his head, earnest, but with a smile playing at his lips. "Sid, I never go back to Russia without talk to you first. You -- jump to conclusions, yeah?”

“I --” Sid tries to say.

“You want me to stay,” Geno says, the barest hint of a question in his tone.

Sid nods.

“Then I will,” Geno says simply.

Sid can barely breathe. “You mean it,” he says.

“Yes,” Geno says, and he sounds sure, but impatient, too. “How you not know this?”

Sid just shakes his head, unable to find words, unwilling to look away from Geno’s eyes. He licks his lips and tilts his head up, boldly puts an arm around Geno’s neck to pull him closer.

He pauses for a quick moment, to make sure Geno knows he can stop this if he wants. But instead Geno drops his eyes, dips his head down and kisses him, and it’s everything Sid’s been longing for. Sid finds his hands in Geno’s hair, cupping the back of his head, soft strands between his fingers. Geno’s hands are warm and firm on his back, and Sid pulls back enough to take a quick breath; he can smell Geno’s aftershave, his shampoo, achingly familiar and yet filling his senses in a whole new way.

Sid lingers, savoring the feeling of Geno’s mouth on his own. When he finally breaks off to gasp a breath, Geno makes a pained noise that goes right to Sid’s heart. He laughs softly into Geno’s neck.

“Just -- catching my breath, G,” he says, and Geno noses at his ear, making him shiver. 

“Yes. Catch breath, so I can steal it again,” Geno says, low, and Sid snickers. 

“Not want more kissing?” Geno asks, faux-innocent, and Sid laughs harder.

“Not if you say things like that,” Sid manages to say.

Geno says, smug, “You lying, I can tell,” and leans in to kiss him again, more insistently. 

Sid parts his lips and Geno takes that as the invitation Sid intended. Kissing turns into making out, a little sloppy, a little dirty. Geno presses him against the wall by the window, and Sid angles his hips to rock against Geno. He pulls away, lets out a soft “Ah!” and Sid smirks into his collarbone. 

“Bed now, Sid?” Geno asks softly, his hand on Sid’s back.

Sid nods. 

“Back in a minute, have bag in car,” Geno tells him. 

Sid goes through the motions of getting ready for bed, including awkwardly brushing his teeth left-handed. He comes back into the bedroom to find Geno changed for sleeping -- pajama pants and a worn T-shirt and --

“You wear socks to bed, Geno? Seriously?”

Geno scrunches up his face.

“Feet get cold, Sid. Not nice to make fun.”

Sid tries (and probably fails) to look contrite.

Geno scowls and heads for the bathroom to brush his teeth, and Sid’s gaze lingers on Geno’s ass in those thin pants. He bets Geno’s not even wearing underwear, and fuck, Sid feels a rush of heat that makes his dick stir hopefully.

Geno climbs into bed beside him and then looms over him, kissing him again, gently, insistently, without hesitation. Slow, syrupy kisses and caresses mean that Sid hardly registers when Geno pulls away to take care of their shirts, and the feel of skin against skin is a heady rush; they’re sure but not urgent, both of them hard but not desperate as they rock together.

“I take off?” Geno asks, pulling gently on the waistband of Sid’s pants.

“God, yes,” Sid blurts out, and flushes at the neediness in his voice.

Geno doesn’t look smug, though, just happy, as he pulls off first Sid’s pants and then his own. 

The mixture of affection and desire in his gaze is intoxicating.

Geno takes Sid’s wrist and places it gently, reverently, on the bed, kisses it through the bandage, saying, “You rest this, Sid.” He fumbles something under the pillow beside him. 

“It’s okay, Geno, I want to --” Sid starts to say, but then Geno shushes him with a kiss. He takes Sid’s dick in warm, lube-slick fingers and Sid forgets what words are. Geno’s mouth is lush and wet against Sid’s, and his hand is moving just right, and Sid is rocking his hips up, fucking into Geno’s hand, and Sid can’t imagine anything better.

He comes not long after, groaning out Geno’s name, panting into his neck, blinking himself back to consciousness. 

“Hi,” he says to Geno, who’s just smiling at him, petting his hair, his dick pressed against Sid’s side, not demanding, just there.

Geno leans in to kiss him again, and Sid reaches awkwardly, left-handedly, for Geno’s dick. Geno gently bumps his hand out of the way.

“But --” Sid protests. 

“I do,” Geno says. “You kiss me, and I do.”

Sid can do that. 

*

Sid wakes up the next morning to the sound of his bedroom door slowly creaking open. He cracks an eye and props himself up on an elbow, and there’s Sarah, blinking from behind her hair.

Sid’s very glad he made sure they got dressed again last night.

“Daddy?” she asks uncertainly.

“Yeah, baby?” Sid can feel Geno shifting next to him, pressing along his back, running his knuckles along Sid’s arm that’s still under the covers. Sid grabs his hand, squeezes it once, warningly. He’s a menace.

“That you, Sarah?” Geno asks, voice hoarse with sleep.

Sid can hear her gasp across the room.

“Daddy, is that _Geno_?”

Before he can muster up the wherewithal to answer (Geno pressing his morning wood firmly against his back is not helping), Sarah continues.

“Did you guys have a sleepover without me?” The sleepy outrage in her voice makes Sid have to stifle a smile.

“Is too early,” Geno says, sounding a little grumpy.

“Sorry,” Sarah says, not sounding it, and Sid moves to get up. Geno tightens his arm around Sid’s waist in return. _Not the time_ , Sid thinks, and unsuccessfully tries to break Geno’s hold.

“Sarah,” Geno says. “You like pancakes, yes?”

Sid goes still.

“Yeah! With maple syrup and butter and strawberries!” she says, sounding a lot more awake.

“I make for you, in one hour. But only if you let me -- and Papa -- sleep more first. I have game again tonight, you know.”

“Oh, yeah! Okay!” she says in a loud whisper, before tiptoeing back out of the room and pulling the door closed behind her. A beat after he hears the latch catch, Sid hears Sarah running down the hall and down the stairs.

“I can’t believe that actually worked,” Sid says blankly into his pillow, and Geno just tightens his hold again. 

“I’m best,” he says, smugly, and moves his hand lower.

Sid grabs his wrist. “I thought you needed more sleep, you faker.”

Sid rolls over to face Geno, who smiles at him, eyes puffy and hair wild. He’s just so cute, and Sid can’t believe Geno’s actually in his bed.

"I tell in interview after game, maybe I not score goal tonight because I had to make pancakes early in morning for Sid and Sarah."

"Geno, don't you dare," Sid says, torn between horrified and amused even though he’s laughing softly.

"Not get enough sleep. Because, you know, Pens management -- bad discipline." He shakes his head, mock-sadly.

Sid laughs some more, _almost_ completely certain Geno’s only teasing. 

Then Geno grabs Sid’s ass to roll him over on top of Geno, and Sid stops worrying about it at all.

*

It’s not uncommon for Sid to attend games, and Sarah, too, of course. But they ordinarily stick to the management suite or Sid’s box. When Geno produces a Sarah-sized Malkin jersey before he leaves for the game, she begs to sit in the stands (“The box is so boring, Dad!”). 

When she slips it over her head, Sid can’t believe how right it looks.

“Text him a picture, Daddy!” she says, and Sid complies, even though Geno won’t see it until after the game.

Sarah insists on going early enough to head down to the glass for warmups. She’s jumping around and waving at Geno all through his stretches; once he’s done, he skates over, winking at her and flipping a puck through a gap in the netting directly into her waiting hands. 

Sid winds up signing autographs, because of course he does, but he’s keeping an eye on Sarah, too. He can’t help laughing at the outrageous faces Geno’s making and at the way Sarah’s hollering back at him.

“Do you _know_ him?” a nearby teenage boy asks incredulously after Geno flips her a second puck. 

She looks up at him and nods solemnly before offering him one of her pucks.

“You want one?”

He looks a little bug-eyed, but “Yeah, thanks!” he says, and flashes her a smile.

*

When Geno scores that evening, his first goal in the last half-dozen games, he points at them meaningfully. Sid and Sarah end up on the Jumbotron thanks to him, beaming and high-fiving each other. 

The crowd roars in response, and Sid knows they're being really obvious, but he can't bring himself to care.


End file.
